The First State might see more state revenue; what do you think they’ll do with it?

We need to cut spending, and drastically, first, before we raise taxes. If we raise taxes either first or even simultaneously, you can count on history repeating itself: the tax increases will just get spent.

Well, our good friends at the Delaware Liberal have been kind enough to prove it!

The Delaware Economic and Financial Advisory Council’s April revenue report mirrors continued positive growth seen last month when the panel projected a $155 million surplus for the current and 2012 fiscal years. DEFAC on Monday approved a $168.5 million revenue increase above earlier projections. Lawmakers can spend up to 98 percent of that sum, or $165.1 million. The Legislature’s budget-writing Joint Finance Committee will hammer out how to spend the extra cash during two weeks of meetings that begin May 16. [...]

In the next few weeks, Markell will make recommendations to the JFC on how to spend the surplus on one-time economic stimulus projects, said Ann Visalli, director of the Office of Management and Budget. Several members of the JFC have indicated they want to use a surplus to restore some of Markell’s $100 million in cuts to the $3.4 billion operating budget.

May I suggest that Governor Markell and the General Assembly do precisely that, especially concerning cuts to programs that help the poor. Lt. Governor Matt Denn, in his meeting with the Progressive Democrats for Delaware earlier this month, indicated that this was the horrible nature of our budget process: that the Governor has to draft his proposal before knowing the revenue projections from DEFAC. And thus, they have to propose cuts or spending pursuant to last year’s revenue projections. Well, now some of those cuts can disappear. Further, this money must not be placed into the hands of the rich via new tax cuts. The rich in this state and this country have not been asked to sacrifice, while the poor and the middle class have borne the burnt of program and spending cuts, not to mention the fact that they pay a disproportionate share of taxes.

This, in small scale, proves what I have been saying about the federal budget. I’ve said that tax increases should not come until spending is under control, because the Democrats Congress wouldn’t use the increased revenues to cut the deficit, but to increase spending.

Fortunately, the increased revenue — assuming, of course, that the projections actually turn out to be reasonably correct — came from better than anticipated economic performance. But, regardless of the source of the increased revenue, our good friends at the Delaware Liberal want to do what liberals do: spend it! No thought of doing something really radical like, now that the hard spending cuts are in place, actually saving the money or paying down state debt, seems to have occurred.

Unless you control expenditures, increases in revenue will forever be inadequate to satisfy the lust for more spending. This is an immutable truth. Spenders ignore it till they run out of other people’s money. Then the bankruptcy chickens come home to roost.